Over the Edge
by Eternal Contradiction
Summary: Sequel to Edge of the Chase: "Relena awoke slowly this time, with a peaceful lethargy that could only be explained through extended drugging." 1xR
1. Prologue

**_Over the Edge_**

Prologue:

A/N: This is a sequel to my story Edge of the Chase. First, I'd like to apologize to my fans who were put off by the idea that Relena died in the last chapter – as the first line of this shows, she didn't. I hadn't even realized that anyone would interpret the ending as Heero killing her, so I wasn't trying to keep anyone in suspense or trick you into thinking she was dead. Though, thinking about it, that does sound like something I would do for those of you familiar enough with my writing.

Enjoy.

PS: Disclaimed.

* * *

_Late Spring, 205_

Relena awoke slowly this time, with a peaceful lethargy that could only be explained through extended drugging. She was exhausted and felt hung-over, and she knew there was something she should be remembering, something important, but it remained elusive. That niggling worry remained, causing her to force her senses into wakefulness. She could hear a dull roar in her ears and it took her a few minutes to identify it as the rush of traffic.

Was she still in front of the Parliament building? If so, why hadn't anyone found her yet?

With that mental question stimulating her senses, Relena's eyes flew opened. She remembered the gun, the fear, and Heero drugging her in the end.

Instead of the cell she almost expected, she was sitting up in a single bed, covered in thick quilt which bunched and twisted around her bare legs. She was lying in her underwear, and the room was still so warm she could feel her energy leeching away with every startled, panting breath she took.

Where was she?

Where was _he_?

Relena stood, yanking the tangled thin sheet off the bed and wrapping it around her. She padded over to the small window, brushing aside the cheap curtain in order to gaze out into the thickly trafficked street below. She didn't recognise it, but from this high up it looked like any generic apartment building in any urban city. She had never lived in a place like this, but she had heard that depending on the location they could get quite pricy.

She couldn't know for sure, but judging from the rust on the metal window frame, this was not one of those times.

"Are we in Australia?" she asked, hearing footsteps approach from behind and pause at her open door.

"Canada," he responded gruffly.

"How long have I been out," Relena questioned hollowly, accepting that he had removed her from the country and hid them somewhere else on Earth without her being awake for any of it. Below her, people continued with their everyday lives as she struggled to realize that hers would never be the same.

"Thirty six hours." Heero told her. "The tranquilizer was mild but you should be feeling some nausea and headaches for the next twelve hours." He gently touched her elbow in the gesture he had used while being her bodyguard to signal there was something he wanted her to do, or somewhere she needed to go.

Relena gasped at the touch, jerking away from him and staring at him with startled, frightened eyes.

"So this is it then?" she asked, not quite sure what the question referred to. She thought that maybe it was the fact that they were hiding out, likely changing identities, and though her heart was still beating, Relena Darlian Peacecraft was effectively dead.

"There's some water and aspirin in the kitchen," Heero told her, not unkindly.

x.x.x

"These are our new identities," Heero said, flipping a file onto the cheap linoleum kitchen table. The papers slid towards her, some of the contents slipping out as it came to an abrupt halt before her. Gingerly, Relena picked up a driver's licence of a girl with short brown hair. Patricia Cecilia Mathers. Her stomach felt sick as she placed it back on the table and picked up his. Robert Dean Mathers. His hair was several shades lighter than it was supposed to be, a three-day old scruff turning into a beard on his face, and rectangular glasses with a thick black frame hiding his eyes. The disguises were more or less effective, but they made her feel uneasy. To have Heero still call her Relena had allowed her to hold on to her own identity, but that was impossible now that she was someone else.

"How did you get these?" she asked, wondering how he managed to retain the connections for false ID's while they were so deeply underground she couldn't even go on the same websites she usually frequented.

"Memorize them. You are now Patty Mathers. Let me worry about getting the rest of the papers we will need to exit the country."

"Trisha," Relena corrected. "If you're going to shorten it, I want to be Trisha."

.x.x.x.

_Late June, 205_

"Isn't Canada supposed to be cold?" Relena whined, fanning herself with a magazine she had snatched from the lobby downstairs. The cheap air conditioning unit in the apartment was spitting out some cold air, but it seemed to be a billion degrees outside and none of the windows opened besides the one the air conditioning was stuck out of. Relena knew that Heero could probably tinker with it a bit and optimize the machine, but he kept telling her they needed to lie low. He was a junior real estate agent, and she was his wife, and neither of them should be able to know how to work a wrench.

"Not in the summer," Heero responded, looking cool and relaxed in a polo shirt and a pair of beige Bermuda shorts. A pair of rounded glasses, in a design she didn't think matched his face shape, were balanced across the bridge of his nose. He looked tiny and insignificant.

"What's the point of being here?" Relena asked. "I mean Canada specifically. There are other places we probably could have disappeared to that were closer."

"Those other places don't have the same land mass, and they don't have thousands of kilometres of unmanned borders into other countries." Heero informed her, rising to rinse out his coffee mug. How he could drink anything made with boiling water was beyond her, but then Relena always had thought Heero was a bit cold blooded.

"Border!" Relena corrected as Heero moved from the kitchen and into his bedroom. "Canada only has one border and it leads directly into the most locked-down country in the world, possibly the universe. You said it yourself. It's only a matter of time before we're located. And then what happens? We run into a country that is virtually impossible to leave?"

"By that time we'll have the proper ID," he said, coming out of the bedroom with a work suit on. Relena could feel sweat trickle down her back at the thought of wearing a 3-piece in this weather. "Now remember, don't leave the apartment for unless you think we've been compromised. Don't answer the door. I'll call you at lunch to check in. Don't answer the phone unless the call is from me."

"Don't accept candy from strangers," Relena finished for him, getting up from her seat in order to fix his tie. "I know the drill. And you better be charming and personable today, or you won't sell that big house on Queen Street and bring home the commission."

"I'll do my best." Heero gave her an easy smile, oozing charm and slight sheepishness of a husband who had just been lectured by his wife.

Relena took an involuntary step away from him, suddenly reminded that she was being wary of him since he had betrayed her trust, and then betrayed the trust of those people he was working for. Coming through and saving her life in the end did not guarantee any kind of happily ever after for them, or even a resolution of any kind. Quick as a striking snake, Heero's arm whipped out and his strong hand closed around her wrist. Relena inhaled sharply, but held her ground.

"These people are dangerous, Relena" he told her grimly. "Do not overestimate your safety again."

"Who are they?" she demanded, yanking her arm away from his grasp. "Who?"

"They're the richest men in the world. They own everything and everyone. Their resources make the Preventors look like children with a mail-order spy kit." Heero straightened his cuffs. "Now, you know the codes."

"Yes," Relena said impatiently, swiping her short brown hair out of her face. She knew that if anything went wrong she couldn't just come out and tell Heero she was being watched, or someone was at the door, in case someone was listening in on the conversation and would be alerted that she was on to them. She also knew that Heero's paranoia had probably saved her life over the past few years, so she was perfectly willing to memorize a few catch phrases. She was just scared that she'd never have a chance to use them. A bullet was quicker than a spoken word to alert him to danger. "I know what to do. Is Quatre involved with them?"

Heero headed for the door, ignoring her question. Despite his silence, Relena inferred that the answer to her question was yes. It would explain a few things that had happened when this had all started a few months before, at the Wattmeter estate. The Winner name was still a weighty thing.

x.x.x

_July 1, Canada Day, 205_

"I'm surprised you wanted to get out of the apartment," Relena said conversationally, her hand starting to sweat from where Heero held it. To the outward world they looked every bit of the married couple they were pretending to be, and after ten years of knowing each other it would have been strange if they didn't automatically fall into a tandem with their movements. No matter how well they walked together, though, there was still an unspoken discomfort between the two of them. Relena just couldn't bring herself to be comfortable with Heero anymore, no matter what their history was, or the fact that sometimes she still looked at him and felt her heart swell with the familiar feeling of love. She still saw the gun sometimes in her sleep, still woke up with a start with the memory of him pressing the tranquilizer into her neck.

He looked like the same man, but sometimes she saw a monster. Other times, well they were the only thing keeping her sane.

"I think I would like a cheese burger," Heero said casually, but his hand tightened across her palm in warning.

Relena tried her best not to tense as she recognised what he meant by bringing up cheese. It was one of the code words they had arranged, and she had to really control her movements not to look around suspiciously for whoever Heero had noticed watching them. "That sounds good," she told him, the words sounding hollow to her ears. If he mentioned fries that meant they were in the clear.

Heero slipped through the crowd, going against the flow as people headed down to the water front to watch the fireworks. Relena's heart felt like it was skipping beats she was so nervous. She wanted to look over her shoulder so badly, and every person who jarred into her suddenly became a suspect. Would they have to move again? Would this be their life: always on the run, always looking over their shoulders for people lurking in alleyways who may or may not see through her disguise?

Relena's hand tightened around Heero's, and she was slightly surprised to find him leading her into a fast food restaurant as if his need for a cheeseburger was a real whim and not just a code word for danger. Even without her doubts about his loyalty – which still festered, despite the fact he had picked her in the end – Relena knew that Heero was overly cautious, and whether this turned out to be a false alarm or not, they would be out of town by midnight.

"Sit here," he told her, pushing her towards a booth with a vantage point of both exits. She obeyed him, casting a suspicious look between him and the window which exposed her to the street. While part of her reasoned that Heero sitting her in a spot which was a sniper's wet dream was nothing to worry about because if someone out there was trying to kill her she would already be dead, the side of her which could no longer trust him eyed the glass with distaste.

He didn't help the matter by disappearing from her view. For a moment she considered turning in her seat to watch him, as though she were some love-sick newlywed, but she was distracted by a conversation going on next to her.

"If that Peacecraft girl was around this wouldn't be happening."

From the corner of her eye she noticed a family of four sitting crammed into the bench seats of the fastfood chain. The children, if she could even refer to them as that, were old – possibly around her age or a little younger – but they still sat with their parents, only now discussing politics apparently instead of the newest action movie. Or whatever young adults discussed with their parents besides politics – Relena didn't exactly have much experience with the concept.

"Well, if she hadn't run away with her bodyguard boyfriend!" the girl said snidely.

"She did not!" the boy interrupted his sister and/or girlfriend. "I'm pretty sure that's just tabloid gossip. You're probably too young to realize this, but she gave up her life since she was fifteen in order to keep the universe at peace. Someone that self sacrificing wouldn't run away with some guy. They're probably both dead at the bottom of a ditch somewhere."

The sister/girlfriend opened her mouth to reply, but the brother cut her off again.

"No. You know what? Even if she did run away with her bodyguard, it shouldn't be made into such a huge deal. This is ridiculous. You'd think the poor girl deserved to be happy."

"Not at the cost of all her hard work being discredited. That bitch-whore better be dead, that's all I have to say."

"I'm sure she is," the father said patronizingly. "Your brother is right. This is the girl who walked into the middle of a kill zone with nothing to back her up but the power of her own words and ideals."

"But the Mars Accord is falling apart without her –"

Relena was interrupted from finding out exactly what was wrong with the Mars accord by Heero showing up at her elbow, a fastfood tray in his arms. He deposited it on the table with a clank, handing her the large fries from his meal. Relena stared at them, feeling disconnected from the sign that they were in the clear. The conversation between the family had turned towards baseball, but all she could think of was the fact that the world she had worked so hard to protect was falling apart around her, and she should be doing something.

She wasn't dead. There was no excuse for her inactivity. Relena might not have willingly disappeared, but in that moment she felt like the bitch-whore the girl had accused her of being.

She ate her fries woodenly and for the first time in months, she didn't taste the freedom in the fact she was still alive to eat.

x.x.x

"You promised me you wouldn't look," Heero hissed in anger, almost slamming the screen of the laptop on her fingers. Relena jerked away from the desk, the current political news page still emblazoned on her eyelids.

"I can't do this anymore," she told him, jumping to her feet and staring at him. For a moment, she thought she was going to hit him or cry, but instead she just turned her back and left the room.

x.x.x

_September 10, 205_

"Here's your breakfast," Relena snarled, shoving the plate in front of Heero so violently, the toast slid off the china. Heero gave her a mildly look, picking the bread up and taking a bite.

"I think it's starting to draw attention that I don't go out during the day without you," she told him as she sat across from him, feeling like an underappreciated housewife and hating it. Her day was yawning out before her, consisting of washing his dishes, vacuuming a floor that never had time to get dirty, making the beds, and finally spending hours running on the treadmill and watching soap operas on television.

And she hated soap operas.

"We could use some extra income," he told her, carefully folding the paper as he read the sports section. She knew he only did that in case a coworker brought up some statistic on the game the night before. She was so distracted by his habits with the news, trying to see if she could catch a glimpse of the world issues page before he handed it to her and left for work, that his words barely registered, and when they did her first thought wasn't that he was almost giving her permission to get a job.

What Relena realized first was that their financial situation really was as bad as it seemed. Both of them were well off in their own right – Yuy Security had possibly grossed the highest annual income in the industry last year – and she had kind of taken it for granted that they were only playing at slumming it.

"Are you telling me I can get a job?" Relena asked, wondering if the world had stopped rotating on its axis, hell had frozen over, and little purple pigs were flying in the sky on pixie wings.

"Part time," Heero told her, putting down the paper and fixing her with an even stare. "You are right. It is strange and noticeable that a husband would keep his young wife locked up when he isn't home. The neighbours are talking. They are hiring at the floral shop on the corner."

"Thank you!" Relena squealed, jumping to her feet and giving him a quick hug and a peck on the cheek. She knew that he would next lecture her on safety measures and go over a complete exit strategy before even allowing her to apply for the job, but right now she was looking forward to it. She had been locked inside for far too long and even the hope of independence sent her head spinning in a rush of gratitude that she completely forgot to be wary of him.

x.x.x

_November 2, 205_

He was watching her.

Relena tried not to make it obvious that she knew, and was trying to sneak glances back at him.

"There is something you should know," Heero said curtly. He had taken off his ridiculous glasses, sticking them into the pocket of his shirt like a yuppie. Relena looked away from the flower arrangement she was fiddling with on one of the side tables to find he was studying her intently, not even bothering to mask it with a distraction of some kind.

"What?" she asked, a chill going down her spine. She had thought, for a moment, that this was one of _those _moments, like the ones they used to have where he would just look at her for the pleasure of it. She hadn't considered that he was assessing her ability to handle whatever information he had to say or wondering if it was something he should even divulge.

"The men that night, the ones who broke into your room with guns, they were hired by the same people who sent me to kill you."

Relena sat down, hard, unable to look away from him either. "Why?"

"Because the votes were divided. Half wanted to send a hit squad and the other half wanted me to deal with it." He was still observing her, that inscrutable expression on his face. Relena wasn't sure she understood why he was telling her this, especially now when the topic hadn't come up in a while. They had been doing so well at pretending they were a normal married couple – Robert and Trisha – only sans the physical relationship because she wouldn't let him touch her in any way except in public.

"So they did both?" Relena asked incredulously. "That literally sounds like overkill."

"They didn't send both. It was decided that I was capable of handling the situation."

It was on the tip of Relena's tongue to mention that obviously he wasn't, but it had been a close call, even then. There was no doubt in her mind that if she had been anyone else, Heero would have assassinated her with ease. Goading him now probably wouldn't make him change his mind, but she still couldn't reach that level of comfort where teasing him was easy. Once her head was clear, she realized the invaluable information he was giving her. There was dissention among the ranks of whoever these men were, and a smart strategist would know how to use that to her advantage.

x.x.x

_December 24, 205_

Relena cried herself to sleep. She tried to keep quiet, but her body visibly shook and some sobs escaped from her mouth, hopefully muffled by the pillow. She mourned for her family and friends, for the woman she was – the one who had ruled the world and took it for granted. Relena cried for her mother, knowing that the older woman would believe her dead and would be unable to enjoy the holiday she usually took so much pleasure from. She cried for that fact the Heero wouldn't let her get in contact with anyone – rightfully so – even at Christmas.

She cried for the batch of festive cookies she had tried to make but had ended up burning instead.

She wasn't quite asleep yet when Heero came in her room, so silently she almost didn't notice his approach. He remained still at the side of her bed for so long, Relena was sure she imagined him until his hand softly touched her cheek and he gently wiped the traces of wetness away from her eyes.

Once she was sure he was gone, Relena wept for him. For the "them" that was now lost forever.

x.x.x

Relena sometimes caught Heero staring at her from the corner of her eye, but instead of looking at him and smiling like she had prior to last spring, she ignored him until he looked away.

She was still punishing him, and sometimes she couldn't even remember why. There was a tension between them of unspoken angst, sometimes sexual and sometimes merely heartbreaking. She didn't even notice the times when he attempted to bridge the gap in his Heero-way, but she always flat-out refused his clumsy attempts to casually touch her arm or engage her in conversation and when she didn't it was because she didn't remember to respond at all.

"I hate you!" she finally screamed one evening when living with him finally got to be too much. "Did you think I could ever forgive you? That we'd just go back?"

The sad thing was that up to that point she had assumed that they could.

He didn't try after that, except for in public.

x.x.x

_February 14, 206_

"There's my beautiful wife," Heero said with a charmingly smarmy smile. He walked over to where she was standing behind the flower counter, leaning across the bar in order to give her a quick peck on the cheek. Sometimes, the roles he could play when they weren't alone still managed to surprise her.

"Robert!" Relena exclaimed, giving him a grin. They were surrounded by the sweet scent of flowers, and Relena felt slightly ill, as though evil had oozed through the cloying scent and turned the air into a miasma of decay. It wasn't Heero who had done it, per se, but it was just the whole situation – the charade of acting like a couple in love on Valentine's Day – when Heero had never even acknowledged the affair back in their real lives.

It really served to remind her and how permanent it all was.

Relena turned to get her coat. She had a fun-filled evening lined up of a romantic dinner at a decent restaurant, followed by a cheesy movie rental, and she couldn't feel more like an ungrateful bitch for not wanting to do any of it.

"Hey Liza," Relena heard Heero greet one of her coworkers. "Do you have that arrangement I ordered the other day."

"Yep," Liza responded. "I even managed to keep it secret from her so she didn't know who it was for."

When Relena re-entered the main room of the store, Heero really did have a bouquet of flowers in his hand. Relena frowned as she headed towards him. He handed the flowers to her without saying a word, and Relena followed him without looking at them, a false smile plastered to her lips. It wasn't until they were out of the store that she looked into the purple paper wrapping, expecting to see the peonies she claimed were her favourite flower – Heero had pointed out that Relena's favourite flowers were widely advertised, and Trisha would need a different preference when she applied for the job at the store – instead, the delicate paper cushioned a bouquet of her beloved orchids.

Relena stared at Heero's profile, amazed that he would break his own precautions for something so small as giving her the flowers Relena wanted, not Trisha. The consequences, should anyone even consider tracing the rare blossoms she held, were monumental.

The paper rustled as the flowers shook unsteadily.

x.x.x

_March 11, 206_

Relena walked in on Heero coming out of the shower, water dripping down the hard planes of his chest and stomach, and one of the cotton towels she had just finished washing the day before draped over his hips. Her breath caught in her throat as she realized she was still attracted to him. It had been something she had been avoiding for months, flinching away from the slightest touch if he accidentally brushed against her.

She stared for a moment, eyes unable to look away. Heero stayed still, allowing her to look with a closed expression on his face. Drawing in a shaky breath, Relena slammed out of the bathroom, hating herself for still wanting him.

x.x.x

_April 7, 206_ – Relena's Birthday

Heero had been on the sewing machine for an hour. At first, it amused her to no end to see him hunched over the appliance so intently, but the novelty had worn off very quickly. The constant grinding noise was giving her a headache, or maybe it was the fact that Heero had informed her he had a new disguise for her to wear and then immediately got to making it. She couldn't concentrate on reading the insipid romance novel she had taken out from the library to mask the mystery-thriller she had really wanted and already finished.

Besides for the disguise factor, they were so domesticated it was sickening.

"Here," Heero said, standing up with what looked to be a strapless bathing suit or the largest pair of panties she had ever seen.

Relena made a noise of revulsion. "What is that?"

"You're pregnant!" he barked, pushing the suit back at her.

"Like Hell I am!" Relena exclaimed.

It took two days before Relena was willing to listen to his idea, and after she did it made an odd sort of sense. She would pretend to go through all the months of pregnancy, and if she had to disappear quickly, she would simply go into a public washroom and remove the fake padding. It was genius in that no one would be looking for a pregnant woman, and if they did happen to find them and noticed her condition, they wouldn't expect her to suddenly become unpregnant.

Unfortunately, even Heero couldn't explain what happened after nine months.

x.x.x

_Early May, 206_

"This morning sickness is killing me," Relena moaned, feeling her stomach churn over from the mild dose of emetic she had self-administered before work. She could feel her forehead break out in a cold sweat, and she really, really hated Heero in that moment.

Her boss clucked her tongue at Relena's discomfort. "Dry toast helped me when I was pregnant for Sean."

"Excuse me," Relena said, bolting to the bathroom at the mention of food. The only positive thing she could see in all this was that she didn't have to wear the stupid suit yet.

x.x.x

_Late May, 206_

"It's been a year," Relena told him, referring to the anniversary of her near death.

Heero grunted in response.

Relena wasn't sure what she had expected when she brought it up, but that wasn't it.

x.x.x

_June 28, 206_

Relena was starting to show. Or at least Heero insisted that she was. Relena personally thought it was too hot, and wished she could put her impending fauxnancy off until autumn, at the very least. It was really inconsiderate of him not to take the summer into account.

She had been wearing loose clothing for the past month to hide the fact her body wasn't undergoing subtle changes and this was the first time she had put on the padding. She was slightly amazed at the transformation he was able to create without going overboard, and as she stood in front of the mirror wearing a tshirt and shorts, she felt the first tugs of grief that this wasn't real.

She ran her fingers over the subtle swell of her belly, disconcerted by the fact she couldn't feel the touch on her skin. Her hands cupped her breasts, feeling the faked fullness of them. Relena's arm jerked away as she met Heero's eyes in the mirror, noticing him watching her.

Her heart pounded. "Are you sure you haven't missed your calling?" she teased. "You make a pretty good seamstress."

x.x.x

_Late July, 206_

"It's hot," Relena whined crankily. "Can't you fix the air conditioning unit for your pregnant wife?"

Heero, proving he wasn't completely impervious to the heat have taken up wearing a wife-beater around the apartment, and his arms were driving her crazy.

x.x.x

_August 10, 206_

Heero was adding another thin layer of padding every week or two and she was growing exponentially and somehow still in the parameters of her four months. She was starting to take shape as a woman having a baby and not one who was just consuming too much ice cream. She never took the bloody suit off, except to shower, and that was only because Heero couldn't figure out a way for her not to get the padding wet. She was irritable and blamed him entirely.

It was just like a man to knock a girl up and then continuously make her wear the fat suit.

"You should make one for yourself and see how you like dragging it around all day, you unconscionable ass," Relena snarled, stomping into the bathroom to take her third shower of the day.

x.x.x

_September 23, 206_

"Sylvia Noventa," Relena mused, noticing with interest as Heero's head twitched towards her in surprise. "Why does that name sound familiar?"

"Her grandfather was an Alliance Field Marshall. I killed him in New Edward."

"Oh," Relena responded meaningfully. "They've just appointed her as Vice Foreign Minister. Replacing me, I suppose. Is she any good?"

Heero grunted noncommittally.

"Well, she turned down killing you," Relena continued, trying to figure out if she was jealous or not. "So either she's spineless or has integrity."

Heero remained silent.

"I don't know who she thinks she's fooling," Relena said bitterly. "She'll never replace me in the eyes of the public." Relena wasn't sure it was even the best idea to try. Her reputation was so tarnished now that anyone trying to fill her shoes would have to deal with public backlash. Some people truly believed she was dead, but others believed the whispers perpetrated by the press that she was hiding somewhere. "If _they_ put her in power, then it wasn't a smart move on their part to trash my reputation first."

x.x.x

_October 10, 206_

Relena actually started to look forward to the days where Heero would get behind the sewing machine for another update on her apparel. It meant she had a few hours free to just be herself, and she spent most of that time in front of the mirror making sure her waistline was still where she left it.

She was starting to see the alternate genius behind Heero's plan. While she was busy trying to fake a pregnancy, which she was starting to believe was far more difficult than actually being pregnant, she didn't have time to concentrate on world issues and obsess about how the stupid Noventa girl was sending peace to hell in a hugeass picnic basket.

Today Heero was completing a whole new suit to mark the entrance into her third trimester. He had studied the pictures in the pregnancy books and was confident that he could make her a stomach with a mechanical mechanism that actually kicked. She had said "yay" with as much enthusiasm as she could muster. Unfortunately for him, it was proving to be more difficult than he thought, but Relena was kind of grateful. That meant she had more time to walk around in her underwear and relish the weight-free feeling.

"Maybe when you're done that you can make me a cute Halloween costume," she suggested as she grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge. She had just finished two hundred reps of situps. "I have to dress up for work this year and I think I'd make a cute Snow White." It took her a moment to realize that there was no answering sound of the sewing machine. Relena twirled around, finding Heero standing a few feet behind her, leaning against the kitchen table.

The bottle slipped through her fingers, impacting on the floor with a crunch of plastic. Water sloshed over her bare toes as Heero took a step towards her, his fingers ghosting over her flat stomach before his mouth crashed onto hers, and he grabbed her, pulling her against him with impatience for the space she constantly enforced between them.

"Heero," she protested against his mouth.

He ignored her, pushing her back against the fridge door. Relena finally gave in, grabbing his shoulder and giving in to his kiss.

x.x.x

_November 15, 206_

"Hello?" Relena said, answering her phone as it rang. She could feel her lips curl up in a small smile at the familiar ringtone.

"Trisha?" Heero asked, the connection interrupted by static. "I'm on my way home early. I'll pick you up from work today, ok?"

"Sure," Relena said, her smile getting wider at the fact she wouldn't have to walk in the autumn chill. "Where are you right now? I still have ten minutes on my shift and we need milk."

"I'm getting on the bridge," he said. "I'll stop in the store on the other side."

"Ok," Relena responded. "Oh, and Robert? While you're there I'd like some—"

Her request was cut off by a terrible cracking noise on his end, sounding like thunder and lightning all at once. A fraction of a second later, she could hear a muted version of the same sound from a distance, echoing through the air around. Liza looked up startled.

"Relena!" Heero yelled into the phone. "Run. Get out now!"

Air whistled on his end and then the phone went dead in her hand. She didn't know what was happening, but she was filled with terror at the idea that Heero would break character and carefully memorized codes in order to warn her away. She knew it had to be terrible. In the distance, Relena could still hear the resonance of an explosion, and screams of people on the street. Her stomach bottomed out in fear, and she ran still clutching the phone in a death grip. Instead of moving away from him, she moved towards the sounds, pushing through crowds of people going in the opposite direction.

"The bridge!" Someone shrieked. "The bridge is collapsing!"

©RelenaFanel.June30.2008


	2. Chapter 1

**Over the Edge**

**Chapter 1**

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_AN: This is for Lizz, who watched Endless Waltz with me and then interrogated me on what I had planned for this story. I didn't tell her much, but she did motivate me into finishing this chapter. With a few carefully veiled threats, she could probably make me finish the story in its entirety. She does know where I live, after all._

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The air smelled of old dust, a musty smell that reminded Relena of death and the family mausoleum in Sank. It was a dry scent of collapsed cement, bent metal and an odd mixture of smoke and fear. The crowds of people were running towards her, away from the bridge, and Relena was having trouble keeping her feet. There were a few, like her, who were trying to get through the throngs of people and to the waterfront. Relena wondered if any of them were also looking for a loved one, or if they were simply the type who enjoyed observing tragedy.

Relena's heart pounded in her ears, and she coughed against the dust and smoke in the air. She knew that despite the slow speed she was moving at that she was getting close, just by the thickness of disaster in the air. Right after the phone had gone dead in her ear, she had heard the screech and groan of metal buckling, and there was no doubt in her mind that once she reached the bridge, she would find it gone.

Heero, she thought, please be alive. If he was, she knew he would kill her for coming towards him instead of fleeing like his last words had told her to. Relena was not a foolish person, or at least she didn't believe herself to be, so she really couldn't understand why she couldn't move away from him.

You love him, that voice in her head informed her again.

The crowd was thinning, and she emerged from it with what seemed like a literal plop in her ears. Suddenly, she was out of the mass of bodies moving against her, no longer swimming through limbs of people running in the opposite direction, and she found herself suspended in space for a moment as she tried to adjust to the lack of resistance. There were still people in her range of view, but she was finally free.

Relena broke into a dead run, a sweat breaking out along her forehead, trickling down her back and beneath her breasts. She couldn't see the bridge yet, or what remained of it, and knew that if she just rounded the next corner it would be right in front of her. No traffic was on the street, and she knew without seeing anything that it would be bad. The situation felt apocalyptical, though she knew that even if there was a high death toll it wouldn't be the end of the world.

Though, it might mean the end of hers.

The sound of screams and panic was a soundless roar in her ears as Relena rounded the corner, coming into full sight of the bridge. It was chaos and death. A thick dust coated the air, half the bridge had disappeared, and the water was full of debris, people swimming to shore, and bodies floating down-stream, lost in the current. Relena stopped dead and stared. A man staggered beside her, blood dripped from a wound on his forehead. A teenage girl pulled herself from the water, thick black mascara trailing down her face. Somewhere, a baby howled. She took this all in, seeing and hearing it in a tableau of a single moment that seemed to stretch for eternity.

Slowly, she made her way down to the edge of the water, staring in disbelief at the tragedy in front of her. She had been in the middle of war zones, visited the scene of natural disasters hours after they happened, but never had she experienced something so devastating and shocking. "Heero," she croaked, in the process of calling his name. Her voice didn't seem to want to work, and she didn't think it was because of the dry dust coasting the insides of her mouth with a foul, sour taste.

Relena swallowed, realizing she was on the verge of panic. Her heart was racing, and her vision was tunnelled on the water. There were heads bobbing against the current, but she couldn't tell if they were his. "HEE-" she started to call again, the act of screaming his name so familiar and heartbreaking that she had to break it off.

Suddenly, her brain went click and she realized that she wasn't supposed to be calling him Heero anymore, and hadn't said his name with any degree of emotion in a long time. What was his name, she wondered. What _was_ his name? She couldn't remember.

Who was he now? And if she called, would he hear her? Would he be able to hear her voice through the muffling water, hear it like a clarion's call and realized he had a reason and purpose to come back to her? If she could call to him, would he listen like he had the time with the parachute at the Alliance hospital? Would it make any difference if she screamed for him and he was already dead?

Relena shuddered, breaking out of her trance. Heero wasn't dead. He couldn't be. This was the man who had walked out of an explosion with only minor bruises. The boy who had self-destructed his gundam and lived to tell about it. He was the closest thing to invincible that she had ever seen, including one or two mythical comic-book heroes. The bridge falling out from under him and the car plunging about thirty feet into the water would be nothing for Heero Yuy.

She would see him again, Relena was suddenly confident about. With this newfound conviction she saw the devastation around her in a new light. Everything wasn't as hopeless as it seemed, it just needed someone to help through the chaos. She was the Foreign Minister, and she was far more equipped to handle this sort of tragedy than most the people here. With resolve, she pushed up her sleeves and went to help who she could.

Starting with the teenage girl who had pulled herself out of the water, now sitting dripping wet in a growing patch of mud with tears trailing down her cheeks as she sobbed. Relena could see her shivering, and soundlessly she peeled off her jacket and handed it to the girl.

The girl stared at her with vacant eyes, not really seeing Relena or the jacket. Carefully, trying not to startle her, Relena wrapped the jacket around her shoulders and staggered up the embankment, suddenly realizing how much territory she had crossed in order to arrive where she was standing. In the distance, the wail of sirens from emergency vehicles came closer to their location. Across the river, Relena could see that the medics had already arrived and somewhere in the back of her mind she remembered that the closest hospital to this position was almost immediately over the bridge. The people on this side would have to be transported to a facility almost fifteen minutes away.

Another chill went down her spine, and it wasn't from the cold. How many lives were in danger, she wondered, just because no one could get the closest hospital? Relena put the question aside in her mind, moving towards the closest calls for help.

By the time the ambulances and emergency personnel arrived less than five minutes later, Relena had already helped a woman pull her unconscious husband from a car. It had surprised her to find her movements hindered by the stupid fake stomach, and for a moment she considered shedding the disguise. This was bigger than her personal safety, and Relena was never one to hesitate to sacrifice herself for others, but it took time to remove the stomach, and that she didn't have.

Relena moved on towards the epicentre of the confusions, the apex where the road met the bridge and the ruins started to incline until drastically dropping off into air. Cars were parked and abandoned along the side, people gathering just below as they searched for missing relatives and friends they lost in the confusion. She couldn't see anyone left in the water. The current had already washed away the debris and bodies, and those who were alive had already found their way to safety. In the distance, there were boats searching the drifting wreckage, and on the other side of the river she could see a rescue team had already been out into the water once and had returned.

X.x.x.x.x

Duo surveyed the scene in front of him with a professional sort of detachment, seeing yet another scene of destruction, more innocent lives lost, all in the name of thankless and thoughtless cause trying to garner attention. "Do we have any intel on who is behind this?"

"No sir," one of his aides answered, a portable computer strapped to his left arm like an over-sized watch as he scanned through the information available. "No one has claimed it as theirs yet. We do have approximation reports, with about 38 dead, 56 injured with about 11 of those critical, and another 23 people are missing."

Duo stared at the bridge, picturing it whole again in his mind. He could see the rapid movement of cars sharing the three lanes of traffic, husbands and wives coming home from work, children on their way back from after school activities chatting in the back seats. He could imagine the public transit buses filled to capacity, the people crammed in like sardines without any room to even stand. Then he could see them all screaming and knocking together as they plunged into the water. It made him sick to think of it. "Those are only preliminary," he said with a sigh. "We can expect those numbers to rise as people don't make it home for supper, or neighbours notice that the Smiths' van isn't in their driveway. We're going to start diving soon for recovery, and you just know that we'll find bodies still strapped in seatbelts."

The whole thing made him sick, but usually he wasn't bothered so much by death. He had seen so much of it over his years that he was usually able to walk through scenes like this and still crack a joke at the end of the day. When had he become so depressed?

Probably around the time his two best friends disappeared, and he was left without information as to whether either of them were alive, or traitors to the cause Relena had almost single-handedly kept intact. Every permutation of the possibilities has entered his head over the last year and a half. Both of them were alive and hiding out somewhere, slowly gathering evidence and material they needed to bring down whoever had drove them into hiding. They were both dead, bodies incinerated, sent into space, or sunk to the depths of the ocean where no one would find them. He also thought that maybe Heero had actually killed Relena, used the trust that had been between them for a decade and stabbed her in the back with it. It chilled Duo's heart to even consider the possibility, but he couldn't forget his last conversation with Relena before she went missing, when she told him that Heero was possibly their enemy. The only thing keeping him sane was the fact Heero had never been located either.

And here he had thought that the idea of love was pretty much based off Relena and Heero. The princess and the war hero. It was pretty much legendary.

Now, the only thing keeping him sane was a dwindling belief in Heero Yuy, a man he called best friend (but not to his face) and one who would make the worst of enemies, and his job. The job he had barely managed to keep when the Press decided to turn their collective backs on Relena and everything connected to her. The changing political clime didn't help, either. He was distrusted by his superiors for being close to both Relena and Heero, and the missions he was sent on became more and more meaningless and unimportant.

Like this one for instance. As if a local terrorist group who collapsed half a bridge was worthy of an agent who had once piloted a Gundam and called himself the Great Destroyer. Pfft. He was being wasted, quite deliberately, while the world went on and he could see if being moulded, oh so subtly, by unknown fingers. It made him want to throw up some nights. Other nights it was just the booze.

"Sir? What do you think? Terrorism?" One of his junior agents/aides asked.

Duo bit his tongue against the immediate sarcastic response that came to mind, reminding himself he was basically relying on his charm and name alone these days to keep his co-workers respectful of him. Even his rank, handed to him by Relena Peacecraft herself in a ceremony that had both of them in sentimental tears and shared smiles at the symbolism of her endorsing him as a Peace Officer, was under question, even though she had simply been the symbol head and guest presenter.

"Either that or some architect out there seriously failed," Duo said instead, grinning inanely to show he didn't mean the comment as any sort of criticism. "We won't be able to investigate this fully until they clear the scene," he said, turning to address the men and women trailing behind him. "Look guys, and I mean that in a colloquial way and not as a gendered term, we're going to be here for a while. Forget about setting up camp for now and get out there and help people."

"But Sir!" The keener from the front broke into his speech. Duo silenced her with a wave of his hand.

"Now I know what you're all thinking. So calm down, we won't be breaking protocol or anything. Nothing says you can't do your interviews with witnesses while handing out blankets or manning telephone lines of people reporting missing loved ones. I want you, you, and you to go offer your help to the hotline, and you four over there to go canvas the area looking for puppy dogs and hurt people you can help. The rest of you are with me." Duo looked at the three people he had left, relieved that his basis of criteria was that if they were annoying, they went away.

The three stared at him evenly with varying degrees of expectancy. One of them was right-out looking disinterested. Duo thought he might like her best, so long as she turned out to be good at her job. "We're going to go integrate ourselves with the medic team and make them send everyone we treat for an interview. Set up camp, you, the one looking at me like I'm the most boring piece of scum ever."

"My name is Agent Tulle."

"Yes, and I AM a boring piece of scum, so good catch. I also did just send two thirds of your team off to do gruntier work than usual. You know why?"

No one answered.

"Not rhetorical," Duo sing-songed.

"Because you observed that the local authorities require aide?"

"Nope," Duo said, popping his P. "Because the best way to get the information people never tell us is to become one of the people people give information to. There's a trust and camaraderie that happens in the trenches, when you're sloggin' through with your fellow man, and hopefully the little baby preventors will be able to figure out how to use that to their advantage."

"Like undercover work?"

Duo was seriously reconsidering the idea he had sent the annoying ones away. He was also wondering if he was becoming a bitter old man at the age of 26. "Exactly." Duo suddenly stopped walking, turning in a circle and making a square with his fingers and holding it up in front of his eye as he judged the distance between himself and the emergency tent. "We'll set up here. Get me my tent and a box of tissues, stat."

"Do you want some chairs, too?" Agent Tulle asked, but since she said it in a sarcastic voice, he took it to be less of a stupid question and more of a mockery of his request. He liked that.

"Sure, and some coffee while you're at it."

He really needed the coffee. Duo turned around once he was alone, finally observing the scene as himself and not a Preventor. It was a shame, a damn, fucked up the ass side-ways with no lube shame what had happened to those people on the bridge. He had seen worse, way worse, during his years, but seeing something like this outside of the war always made his stomach clench in fury and the part of him who was influenced by the nuns and the old priest yearn to say a quick prayer for the dead.

And at the same time he recognised the scent of despair and death, crumbling mortar and stale dust that had settled on the air and for the first time in months he felt like he could breathe. This is what his lungs were accustomed to. He had grown up breathing air like this, had killed his first man as bombs shuttered and pulsed around him, and though he had no control over this situation, he knew how to get things done in an environment like this one.

As the tent went up behind him, Duo struck a deal with the medics to send over anyone who wasn't seriously hurt and who could possibly bear witness to the event. Duo would believe it when it happened, as he knew for a fact that medics were usually so involved with helping people that the outside world didn't penetrate into their thought process – and he couldn't exactly condemn that, now could he? He also knew that medics usually were a cautious lot, and most of these people might be patched up and let go during the first wave of the emergency, but they would all be strongly encouraged to make their way to the hospital.

Maybe he should loan out his SUV as a shuttle. That would get him information.

Duo felt a wave of frustration at the situation. He wasn't the local Preventor liaison here and didn't have the type of contacts that takes years of trust to cumulate. At best he would be seen as someone interfering with the local authorities, and at worst the enemy. He knew how this kind of thing worked and how territorial Preventors got about their territory, and here he was from the head office, taking over the situation.

As a punishment, not because someone higher up thought he was needed.

"I'm perfectly fine!" a woman protested from a few feet away, her hands clasped tightly around a protruding stomach. "I was just trying to help, I wasn't even here when the bridge collapsed. I just got dizzy from a moment. Exhaustion, nothing more."

No, Duo thought as he watched this exchange, it couldn't be. The dust from the bridge must carry an auditory hallucinogen, because unless he was mistaken, the woman sounded exactly like Relena. "Excuse me!" he called out as she was led into the medical tent.

"You can talk to her when we're finished, Agent Maxwell. We agreed." The doctor informed him with a stern look before following the lady and his aid through the flap.

Duo was left standing outside of the make-shift med-bay, seriously worrying about his sanity. He considered following them into the tent, but could also imagine coming face to face with some stranger who would then scream at him, and then he'd alienate the doctors who were reluctant to help him anyway. It would be an overall bad situation.

"We're set up for you to start interviewing people now," one of his aides said quietly at his elbow. "If you don't mind me saying, sir, you look like you've seen a ghost."

Duo snapped to attention, realizing that he was allowing every dark thought and impatient need flitter across his face. "I want to speak to the woman in that tent. I believe she has information which could be useful to our investigation. Make sure she is delivered to me as soon as the doctors finish with her."

x.x.x.x

"No!" Relena snapped, jerking away from the doctor as he pulled out a heart monitor. She gave him her best evil-eye as she backed away. "I just felt faint for a moment. I'll sit down and have something to drink, but I don't need to be checked out."

The doctor looked at her warily, and Relena could see that he was trying to formulate a response that would both calm her and put her at enough ease that she would allow him to do his job. What he didn't realize was that she couldn't let him check out her health, or she would be discovered. She was just grateful that the emergency response tent didn't have a full-body scanner like most hospitals had as a built-in function of the examining rooms. She knew that the first things those machines did was check for a DNA match so it could pull up her charts, and then it would scan her health. All this doctor had was a small hand-held device, and there was no way she was allowing him near her with the thing.

There were two things a machine like that would note right off the bat: one, that she was Relena Peacecraft Dorlian, the former Foreign Minister, former Queen, formerly missing news sensation, and two, that she was actually NOT pregnant.

Relena wasn't sure which revelation would be more shocking to the doctor, but she was pretty sure which one would get more media attention. And it was not the one common sense dictated it would be.

"Why don't you take a seat then," the doctor responded calmly, gesturing towards a chair. "My nurse will get you something to drink. While she's gone, why don't you let me check to make sure your baby is healthy?"

"No, thank you."

"Now dear, after a traumatic ordeal like this one..."

"No," Relena interrupted firmly. "I would rather not. Please excuse me." She turned on her heel, almost expecting to be stopped. She occasionally forgot that sometimes professionals were simply professionals, not enemies in disguise. The doctor let her leave without trying to convince her again to allow a check-up.

She was grateful.

Relena relaxed a bit, breathing easy for the first time since one of the medically trained aids had escorted her into the tent, worried that she looked pale.

Letting her guard down was a mistake.

A hand grabbed her arm, firm but not rough. Relena tried to jerk free, but the fingers tightened. "This way, miss," the man said, directing her to the left.

"No," Relena hissed. "I won't go with you."

"I'm afraid you don't have a choice," he told her, pushing her through the entrance of a nearby tent.

Relena stumbled, turning to face her abductor. "Get your hands off me. I don't know what you want, but I want to leave now." The bravado was for show. Inside her stomach was in knots, and her heart rate was rapid. She could feel her back break out in a cold sweat, and her mind was quickly going through escape strategies and places to run.

Why hadn't she listened to Heero? Why hadn't she taken off when the bridge collapsed with her false ID and enough money to pay some shady pilot to take her off world?

"What's this, Deroy? Taken up manhandling pregnant women? Haven't you figured out yet that next to young mothers, they're the most likely to kick you in the balls if they feel threatened?" This was all said in an amused tone that belied the steal of the reprimand beneath it. Relena would recognise that voice anywhere.

She just didn't know if this was her lucky break, or if her whole new and carefully constructed world just came crashing around her in two fell swoops – first the bridge, and then being tracked down and identified.

"Hello Duo," she said, turning and looking him straight in the eye.

RelenaFanel © 15/05/2009


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